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“Stop being weird!” I yell, turning my back on him as I pull the lid off the super, a few bees coming out casually.
“Why don’t they ever sting you?” he asks, pretending to be bothered by the way the bees respond to me versus the way they respond to him.
“You need to start bathing. I think they like the smell of your sweat or they just find you a threat. You are pretty crabby and hard to read.”
Our eyes meet just as I say the last part and the hum of the bees vibrates through me or is it the tension that’s still electrified below the surface.
His sharp angular jaw tenses with my words, clenching hard and he runs a hand through his brown curls, pushing them to the side and out of his eyes. He regards me with a quiet reverence that makes me feel less defensive and more curious.
“Listen, Pen,” he starts, blowing out a hard breath of air. “It isn’t you—”
My laugh cuts him off instantly, slipping out before I can control it and it’s completely warranted. He isn’t seriously going to use that old ass line on me. I hold up a hand, still laughing as I try to get myself together.
“Don’t,” I say, barely getting the word out through my laughter.
“Sorry, I have no fucking clue what to say. I don’t want to be a jerk,” he admits, sheepishly looking down at the ground.
“Then don’t.”
“I have no idea if I can be in a relationship. I’m not very good at them and I think you deserve more than this,” he says, motioning around the vineyard. “You deserve someone who isn’t...” He stops, looking himself over as he shrugs. “Someone who doesn’t permanently live at a vineyard and who doesn’t come home smelling like rotten grapes and whose hands aren’t always dirty.”
“You sell yourself short, you know that, right? There may be women out there who hate all those things, you may have even dated them, but I hear you and it’s all good.” He doesn’t respond right away, and I wish I could read his mind, because what he’s articulating isn’t everything he’s thinking and feeling.
He’s never been an open book, if anything he’s far more private and reserved than anyone I’ve ever met. I honestly don’t believe it’s me in this situation, but it is more him. Something is holding him back from letting go and finding what he wants in me.
“I’ve been looking at mead recipes,” he now says, changing the subject quickly and when he makes eye contact with me, everything on his face screams for me to not acknowledge the awkwardness of the shift.
“Oh really? I have too. Do you want to give it a go on Saturday morning? I’m off.” I ask, almost forgetting about my date on Friday night. But it’s just that: a date, nothing more. It could be a complete disaster and then I’ll at least have the comfort of Somerville’s, the bees and making mead with Tommy to remind me that my life here is pretty great.
“Yeah, sure. I’ll take the day off and we can figure out what the hell we’re doing,” Tommy responds, and it feels good to move beyond the awkwardness that blanketed our earlier conversation.
“Did you move the honey from the shed?” I now ask, realizing we never really found a storage place for it. We canned about a dozen jars of raw honey in preparation for making mead and all I hope now is that we did it right.
“I moved it up to my house. I was worried it would spoil or crystalize with how warm the sheds can get.”
He mentions his house and suddenly the weirdness returns. It’s like now his house is this reminder of all the naughty things we did together and mentioning it makes it all flash through his head.
Better burn the fucker to the ground or better yet, let me have it because I couldn’t give a shit what happened in it. I’d live there even if someone told me it housed a dead body for a month. Light a candle and get over it.
“You know it’s okay for you to talk about where you live. I want you to know I don’t associate your house with our trashy one-night stand. All I picture is your epic fucking shower and to die for view.”
“Good to know I was that memorable,” he mutters, and I can’t tell if he’s being his usual snarky self or if he’s truly insulted.
“Don’t take it personally, your shower wins out over everyone I’ve ever slept with.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Tommy
Penny wanders off after our weird ass conversation and I watch her, unable to look away. I don’t even know what that was just then, what the fuck I was even trying to say.
“God, you’re an idiot,” I mumble to myself, as I turn back to the hives, the quiet hum of the bees filling the air. A couple of them fly out and buzz toward me and I can’t help but lift my arm, sniffing as I wonder if Penny’s right and they do like the way I smell.
Or maybe I just need a fucking shower, I think to myself as I turn and head back toward Somerville’s.
I head into the main building, walking back toward Lauren’s office to clear it with her about me not working this weekend. I know she’ll be cool with it. She’s always telling me I work too much anyway, but I do want to give her a heads up.
“Lauren?” I call as I step into her office. “Oh shit, sorry,” I blurt out as soon as I walk in.
